How to Hold Public Conversations About Climate Change

Encouraging discussion about climate change among the Scottish public is seen as critical to achieving national targets. The Scottish Government, ClimateXChange and Climate Outreach have developed a suite of materials that provide a comprehensive, evidence-based guide to holding public climate conversations. Climate Outreach will also be holding a webinar on 19 October to discuss the topic and the new resources further.

A ‘How To’ Guide, including a script and associated images, have been developed by Climate Outreach, which will be of value to any organisation wishing to encourage discussion and action on climate change. Climate Outreach also have published three reports on the research behind the How To Guide.

Climate Outreach highlighted four principles and recommendations when holding a Climate Conversation:

- Keep it simple - A few resources are enough to spark conversation - basic visual prompts, accompanied with everyday language, allow participants to engage in discussions about climate change.

- Don’t focus on discussing the science of climate change - People do not feel confident talking about the science of climate change, so steer away from the numbers, graphs and jargon.

- Focus on things that matter to people - It’s important to remember climate change is not front of mind for most people. Start, continue and end with where people are - their immediate concerns, hopes and lived experiences.

- People enjoy participating in climate conversations - People enjoy talking with their peers about climate change - they hear about the issue on the news but rarely get the chance to talk about how they feel about what they hear.

Climate Outreach are also hosting a webinar on 19 October to further discuss the project. Participants include Dr Chris Shaw from Climate Outreach and Ragne Low of ClimateXChange.